Hunt for overdue books is Unique

Jeff-based company hired by libraries

Elizabeth Wilson trained Tony Pursley at Unique Management Services, a collection agency for libraries with 600-plus clients. Dick Neal, one of the company's salesmen and its manager of strategic partnerships, is scouting as far away as England for more work.

Bonnie and Clyde, they are not. Still, they have stuff that doesn't belong to them.

And they have been reminded of that. "The reality is, they have been notified over and over and over," Bill Bolte said.

The notices are now coming from Unique Management Services. That company calls 5,000 or so people every weeknight and on Saturdays.

The people who get these calls all owe a public library something. And, as never before, they are not going to get away with it.

"I have a moral obligation, as well as a legal one, to get materials back," said Bolte, director of the Jeffersonville Township Public Library, the nearest of Unique Management's 600-plus clients.

The company makes its calls from downtown Jeffersonville, from what most recently was a Dollar General Store. The building has space for two, maybe three, times as many callers as the 50-something it has now. After all, most libraries still are not clients.

Co-owners Lyle Stucki and Charlie Gary have confidence in their company's novel niche, though. What library easily can afford to replace everything not returned? Besides, some items cannot be replaced, regardless.

"If they (the libraries) don't do something, the signal to the taxpayer is that they are not very good custodians of funds," said Susan Miller, director of the Bedford Public Library, which uses Unique.

Miller said Unique knows what to do and how to do it better than libraries themselves.

"The thing that has surprised me most is that there is such a big need," Stucki said.

One client, the public library in Floyd County, lost 1,759 items -- $22,000 worth -- one recent year.

Stucki and Gary, old pros at collecting money for businesses, had a few libraries as clients before setting out to corner that market. Unique Management was established in Louisville 11 years ago but soon moved across the river because of lower costs.

Its lights burn longer than most -- to reach scofflaws on the West Coast.

By the time a name pops up on team leader Jason Loudermilk's computer screen, the book or CD or whatever is typically a couple of months' overdue. Unique Management pursues the borrower for up to four months, using a series of letters and calls that ultimately can lead to a credit black mark.

Stucki said that final action is taken less than 10 percent of the time, a hardball thrown only after what the company calls its "gentle nudges" have failed.

Sensitive to public relations, libraries insist on a honey-over-vinegar approach. They can be businesslike only to a degree. Neither Bolte nor Libby Pollard, associate director of the New Albany-Floyd County Public Library, reports much ire from turned-in patrons. The partnership pays off.

"We may have had a couple of people who've complained," Pollard said.

Unique Management would not let me listen in on any of its calls, citing privacy concerns. I did hear fictitious case studies used to train callers. The expectation is calm politeness. Typically, people have forgotten what they have borrowed. There's a mix-up they will rectify.

Believe it or not, said Unique Management's chief operating officer, Nicole Atkins, her callers often are thanked, not cursed.

"These are not people who've run up a credit card with thousands of dollars and no intention of paying," Atkins said. "It's not uncommon we're dealing with people like myself and you."

Libraries pay Unique Management a fee for each borrower it pursues. Generally, it does not attempt to collect overdue fines; it tries to get the library's property back or obtain payment for the replacement cost.

Dick Neal, one of the company's salesmen and officially its manager of strategic partnerships, is scouting as far away as England for more work.

Some libraries grin and bear their losses. Others lean on prosecutors or use traditional collection agencies.

Neal said his challenge is describing Unique Management for how it is more than for what it is. He has to fight "that collection-agency mentality, that anxiety," he said.

Dale Moss' column runs Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays on the Indiana page. You can reach him at (812) 949-4026 or by e-mail at dmoss@courier-journal.com. You can also read his columns at www.courier-journal.com.

Louisville, Kentucky • Southern Indiana

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Hunt for overdue books is Unique

Bonnie and Clyde, they are not. Still, they have stuff that doesn't belong to them. And they have been reminded of that. 'The reality is, they have been notified over and over and over,' Bill Bolte